How I Could Have Been Damaged

When I was growing up, before a good part of the protective bubble that envelops nearly every American kid, there were a number of ways I could have been damaged (and was, in some cases!)

I had a toy called the SST - it consisted of a little vehicle that was revved up by pulling a plastic rip cord through a central wheel, and then letting it go down the street.  If you didn't position your hand holding the vehicle just right, you could get a nasty friction burn between your thumb and forefinger.

My Stingray, the bike of choice then, had to be redesigned in the following years after my model.  It featured a gear shift on the center bar.  Apparently it was in just the wrong position if a boy should slip forward and end up straddling the gear shift.  Happily, that never happened to me!

Most kids at the time played with gunpowder - in the form of cap guns - and the rolls of ammunition, which consisted of  bits of gunpowder encased in  little paper bubbles  The roll would be fed through a cap gun, which would set each off with a loud bang and a puff of smoke.  Of course, after a while, we just took the rolls of ammunition, set them down on the curb, and just set them off  by pounding rocks on them.  All we wanted was the boom.  It's a good thing it didn't occur to us to perform a little surgery and collect all the little drops of gunpowder into something more potent.

Of course, it wasn't always the toy that was dangerous.  At one time, I attempted to take apart an old radio - while it was plugged into the wall (actually, it was plugged into the side of the house outside, where I could go about my mischief undisturbed).   As a result, I remember precisely where I was when I learned, with a jolt, about the dangers of electrocution.  Some years later in junior, not surprisingly,  I earned my single worst shop class grade in the Electrical class.